E-Governance Updates: 2/7/09

ISRAELI FIRMS EYE SLICE OF INDIA’S E-GOV PROJECTS
Bangalore
The Economic Times (Delhi edition)

Israeli technology firms are joining the race for India’s e-governance projects, seeking to offer solutions for the unique identification card programme.

“Israeli companies may bid along with Indian ones as we always need local partners for e-governance projects”, Consul General of Israel Orna Sagiv said on Wednesday. Sagiv was heading a delegation of 14 Israeli software companies to Bangalore to explore the opportunities in the Indian market and find local partners.

Trade between the two countries is at $4 billion in 2008, up from $3.3 billion in 2007. Israeli exports were at $2.4 billion while Indian exports stood at $1.6 billion.

Israel will be looking to partner the Indian technology giants especially because the country has e-governance solutions like e-payment, e-documentation, registration of population and citizen smart cards already running. “Many governments around the world came to Israel to see how we did it,” said Katrin Melamed, business development manager (software industry) at the Israel Export and International Cooperation Institute (IEICI), who is leading the Israeli IT delegation on a weeklong trip to India.

India is among top three trade partner for Israel in Asia and one of the top 10 trade partners globally. “This year our government decided to put special effort and give incentives to Israeli businessman who want to explore the Indian market,” said Ms Sagiv. Ms Sagiv said that the global crisis just showed Israel that the future is not only in the US and Europe, which are its traditional market. “ India and China are our markets now which are growing”, she said.

With about 3,000 indigenous IT firms, spanning hardware and software, the Israeli hitech industry has grown exponentially as the export of software from Israel has reached to $5.8 billion against $90 million in 1990. Some 40 percent of the revenue comes from the US, 20 percent from Europe and rest from other nations.” I am expecting Asia will account for more than 30 percent this year and India will play a significant role,” said Ms Melamed of IEICI.

E-ADMISSION FOR COLLEGES
Cuttack
The Telegraph

The state department of higher education has introduced a common e-admission policy for 60 colleges offering Plus Two courses.

Under this system, students passing Class X will no more have to apply to different colleges through multiple application forms.

“A common admission form to any of the Plus Two streams at the 60 colleges has been introduced from 2009-10 session,” a senior official of the department said. The forms can also be downloaded from www.dheorissa.in, till July 15.

The colleges include 50 government colleges, College of Basic Science and Humanities under Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology (OUAT) and nine government-aided colleges at Rayagada, Nawarangpur, Sonepur, Baudh, Deogarh, Jharsuguda, Nayagarh, Jagatsinghpur and Kendrapada.

ECR STORES DEPT ADOPTS E-TENDERING SYSTEM
Patna
The Times of India

ECR GM Girish Bhatnagar on Tuesday inaugurated e-tendering system at the stores department of ECR headquarters at Hajipur.

Speaking on the occasion, Bhatnagar said the new system would ensure transparency in the functioning of the stores department of the zonal office. Besides, it would save time as tenders can be awarded to firms online, he said.

The GM said the new system would automate the process of issuing tenders and submission of forms. Tabulation would also be computerized. The bidders intending to participate in the tendering process can access the website www.ireps.gov.in, he said and added other departments of railways should also adopt e-tendering system to maintain transparency in their functioning.

Later, the GM released a booklet on impressed items on the occasion. ECR controller of stores Kameshwar Choudhary and other officials attended the function.

ID PROJECT CAN BE COMPLETED FAST USING MOBILE
Kumar Shankar Roy, Chennai
The Times of India (Chennai edition)

Here is something for Nandan Nilekani and team to chew over as they start work on giving every Indian a unique ID card. Traditional methods for data collection like census are built on initial enrolment as well as moving data in a physical manner which means huge waste of paper, storage, time lapse due to conversion of physical to electronic form resulting in undue delay.

Simply by adding a smart card to a mobile phone with camera and using digital signatures, what can be done in two years could be easily achieved in a matter of months as all the information at the point of contact between the applicant and the agent can be digitally converted and uploaded in real time.

The Chennai-based Odyssey Technologies is launching its product ‘Epic’ with which a camera mobile phone consisting of a resident application and a secure key mechanism for creating digital signatures will make the use of conversion equipment like scanners and computers redundant for physical data collection.

An electronic signature is any legally recognised electronic means that indicates that a person adopts the contents of an electronic message. The company is initially in discussion with private banks, credit card companies, insurers for Know Your Customer (KYC) processes and is also targeting e-governance projects such as voter ID and PAN card which involve large-scale collection of data samples.

PATNA BETTER THAN CHENNAI TO DO BUSINESS
T K Rohit, Chennai
The Times of India (Chennai edition)

At the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas in January this year, Tamil Nadu electricity minister Arcot Veerasamy made a startling statement. He advised investors that instead of blindly narrowing their choice to the IT sector, they should consider putting their money in other areas — even brick kilns! Perhaps he was aware of the ground reality, even though he was laughed at then.

A recent survey instituted by the ministry of commerce and industry and carried out by the World Bank and the International Finance Corporation, ranked Chennai a dismal 15th among 17 cities in India for doing business. What is surprising is that Chennai lags behind even Patna, the notorious capital of Bihar where people usually don’t venture out after dark.

Industry circles in the city do not agree with the ranking, especially since Chennai is home to almost all the car majors in the world and IT companies and houses the back office of even the World Bank. But they do agree that a lot needs to be done on the ground for the city to reach no. 1 position, such as doing away with red tapism and corruption. E-governance also would help the city win investors’ confidence, they say.

“The state should establish a proper single window system, which should reduce the time taken to set up a business and also reduce the processes involved. While an announcement regarding single-window system has already been made, it remains to be seen how it is going be implemented,” K Purushothaman, regional director of Nasscom, said.

He said computerisation of the whole process of setting up a business would mean lesser hassles for those investing or starting a business here. “At the moment, CMDA and DTCP approvals take a long time. For the IT sector, we have an infrastructure tax, and we are the only state in the country to do so. Hyderabad effectively implements e-seva,” he added.